Striving for Control
by Midnyght Saber
Summary: Completely AU. Rather than being rendered half-ghost, Danny is the victim of a full-blown possession, the animalistic Phantom within seeking nothing more than safety and security far from the loving arms of Danny's ghost-hunting parents. Explanation insid


**Disclaimer:** _Danny Phantom _and all related characters and information are the property of Butch Hartman and Viacom International Inc. "Voices" is the property of Disturbed and Giant Records, which is owned by Warner Bros. Records, a subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

* * *

One thing I need to make clear is that this is breaking off of the typical _Danny Phantom_ storyline from the very get-go. Instead of being half-ghost, Danny is a victim of an otherworldly second consciousness that has been infused into his mind during the accident and is now slowly taking over. He can use only the most rudimentary of ghost powers (intangibility, invisibility, slight ability to hover) and that is it.

* * *

Dodging behind a dumpster, Danny's azure eyes glimmered with faint veins of green in the shadows, and he pushed himself further into the small space afforded between the hulking piece of metal and the building wall, praying that those following him wouldn't be able to trace him to his less-than-perfect hiding spot.

"Danny," a soft female voice chorused, and the sound grated against his nerves, sending his entire system into a panic that took nearly all of his self-control to quell. "Sweetie," the voice called again, and something in the back of his mind assured him that the voice belonged to someone he could trust. It was only a momentary flash of security before animalistic instinct claimed him again, and without another thought, he walked soundlessly into the ground, moving with calm certainty towards a storm drain far below.

**So, are you breathing?**

**So, are you breathing?**

**No, no.**

**Are you breathing?**

**So, are you breathing?**

**No!**

Only seconds behind his descent into the dark underground, a form looked behind the dumpster that had been hiding the teen. A few strands of reddish-brown hair peeked out from a hastily-raised blue spandex hood, concerned lavender eyes hidden behind red goggles. Nearly bowling the woman over was the panting and obviously tired form of an older gentleman in an orange and black hazmat body suit, salt-and-pepper hair mussed and matted to his forehead.

"Maddie, I thought you said Danny came this way."

The woman shook her head. "I _thought_ he did. I'm worried about him. He looked so scared when you pulled out the Fenton Bazooka. You'd think he was a ghost from the way he bolted out of the house."

The man shrugged. "He probably thought I was going to make him clean out the barrel. There's a bit of ecto-sludge stuck just inside here and my hands aren't exactly designed for getting into that kind of small space."

"Oh, really?" the woman asked. "And yet you built it with those particular specifications."

"Yeah, but I never thought about cleaning. These hands serve one true purpose outside of building weapons," he exclaimed, seemingly pausing for effect. "Holding lots of food!" he exclaimed, and the woman huffed slightly, leaving the alley and continuing on in what she figured was the path that their son had taken as he fled.

- - - - -

Hovering just a few inches above the narrow walkway lining the side of the drainage pipe, the bedraggled teen floated slowly along, his frayed nerves finally starting to calm, and a pervasive sense of ease filled his mind. However, with that calm came the weird voice that had been haunting him as of late, something he considered a pest and a voice that, rather than working towards self-preservation, fought for his destruction.

**Wake up!**

**Are you alive?**

**Will you listen to me?**

**I'm gonna talk about some freaky shit now**

"Mom!" the voice called loudly, though no words escaped the boy's lips. "We have to go home! I can't run from them like this!"

_I have to run_, Danny assured himself. _I'm not safe around those who want to destroy me. I need to keep clear of the hunters. It's just panic and fear creating that voice in my head._ And run he did, though it was more of a speedy drift than actual running, the young man refusing to leave evidence of his expeditious retreat from the lair of the specter hunters.

**Someone is gonna die**

**When you listen to me**

**Let the living die  
**

**Let the living die  
**

On the edge of town, the drainage pipe opened into the lake, and the youth, finally allowing himself to land on the slightly slippery rocks, slowly worked his way to level ground, and, curling up under a rocky overhang, allowed himself to fall into a restless sleep.

- - - - -

Clouded azure eyes met the faint rays of morning sun as they opened, and Danny sat upright, his head coming into swift and painful contact with the rough rock overhead. Reaching a hand behind his head, he felt around the sore spot, assuring himself that there was no blood and that he hadn't just condemned himself to die in who knows what non-existent hole in Amity Park. Looking towards the source of the light, Danny crawled slowly towards the opening to the recessed overhang he'd apparently slept in over the course of the night. Sitting upright as he managed to worm out of the small gap that closed the recess off from the rest of the world, Danny rubbed at his eyes. The previous night was another blur of sound and fear and internal pain, and he wondered silently how often this would happen before the aftereffects of the accident would finally wear off.

**Say, wake up!**

**Are you alive?**

**Will you listen to me?**

**I'm gonna talk about some freaky shit now**

The first few times this had happened, he'd merely locked himself in his room, so waking up in the middle of some park, without a single thought or memory of how he got there in the first place, told him that the episodes were only getting worse rather than better. For the first time in the five months since the accident, Danny was seriously considering talking to his parents about the explosion in the lab and the strange voices that accompanied the dark nothings in his memory, the inexplicable blanks that usually only lasted a few minutes, were occasionally a few hours long, and now had become an overnight thing, possibly multiple days as he had neither a watch nor his cell phone with him to tell him the date, let alone the time.

Standing, Danny stretched a crick out of his back and started walking for what seemed like the most likely direction for there to be a walking trail. He'd only managed to travel a few feet before his legs locked under him, his body refusing to bend to his will, and a voice screamed in the back of his head, sending Danny immediately to his knees, the hoarse shout bursting like fire behind his eyes.

**Someone is gonna die**

**When you listen to me**

**Let the living die  
**

**Let the living die  
**

_Don't make me go back! They'll kill me!_ it pleaded, searing cold rushing through Danny's body, the entity trapped within his mind trying desperately to regain control.

Struggling to his feet, the world thrown into painful contrast, his eyes burning with the sight and throbbing because of the exertions of the voice buried somewhere in his mind, Danny slowly started making his way in the direction he'd initially meant to travel in, fighting to regain the use of his legs with each step that threatened to end with him once again face-down in the dirt.

**Say, are you breathing now?**

**Do the wicked see you?**

**You still breathing?**

**You're making me known!**

After nearly an hour, the voice resigned and fell silent, a sense of mortal foreboding claiming Danny's thoughts, and despite the urge to turn tail and run as far from his parents as possible, he continued on, having found a paved trail about ten minutes prior.

It took nearly three hours to find out where it was that he had ended up, and once he had, it was still another hour and a half walk back to Amity Park and home. Something told him that what had happened in the dark span of no memory was going to be something that left his parents asking a load of questions, and about five minutes after he'd crossed the city limits, Danny settled the internal debate and assured himself that he'd talk to his parents once he got home, letting them know what had really happened in the lab nearly half a year ago.

**Are you breathing now?**

**Do the wicked see you?**

**You still breathing?**

He'd made it onto the top step of his house and had just rung the doorbell when the voice behind his eyes exploded, and his world quickly rolled over to black.

- - - - -

Quickly turning invisible, as the doorbell had already been rung, Danny jumped off of the steps in time to see the front door swing open, a haggard-looking red-haired female looking out into the empty air, her lavender eyes filled with worry and hope. Somewhere deeply rooted in his mind, Danny knew that the concern in her eyes was for him and that she had thought he'd finally returned home.

**So, what's up?**

**I wonder why**

**Do you listen to me?**

**I'm gonna make you do some freaky shit now**

Raising his body nearly a foot off of the ground, he hovered away from the house that had almost become his prison, heading for distant points unknown, seeking only his freedom and his life in this madcap escape attempt.

- - - - -

Maddie dropped to the sofa heavily, burying her face in her hands though no tears had come to her eyes. She'd cried too much in the past few days, and she was almost certain that she'd aggravated her tear ducts to the point that they would no longer function. A brief flash of black hair through the window had given her hope, and when the doorbell had sounded, she was almost certain Danny had finally come home. However, as soon as the door was open, the mirage of her son had vanished into thin air, her only guest at the door being a cold burst of wind. Closing the door dejectedly, she knew that her son was almost certainly lost to her.

Still unsure of why he had fled three nights previously, not a moment was wasted after they had lost him in the alley, and the local authorities had been contacted immediately. An Amber Alert had been issued, and everyone that could afford the time had been looking around the local area for their son. The newspaper had run a "Have you seen me?" on the front page for the last two days, and Danny's two friends had spent nearly all of their time out of school scouring the city on their scooters, despite protests from both their families that they had to take some time out for sleep if they were going to be so determined to aid in the search for the teen.

Part of her believed that it was the weapon itself, carried by Jack from the basement to the dinner table, was what had started the whole incident, and though it could have been the fact that it was a large weapon and Danny ran in fear of his father accidently firing the mechanism, she was sure that he had known the ammunition would only harm ghosts. At the sight of the gun, she had been almost positive that there had been an otherworldly gleam of jade in his normally icy blue eyes before he'd bolted from the table. It had omly been a momentary flash, one that she had nearly convinced herself was something conjured up by the concern she'd been feeling about the whole situation.

- - - - -

Had he not seen the newspaper displayed around the city, Danny would have gone visible sooner, especially considering that the use of his powers taxed him to the point that the human consciousness he worked so hard to restrain could once more come to control, and right now, the last thing he needed was to be either seen or heard in a city that was on high alert for a runaway teenager.

**Insane, you're gonna die**

**When you listen to me**

**Let the living die  
**

**Let the living die**

Flying along as well as he could, he dodged and weaved between the pedestrians and remained intangible when there was no other option. Restrained in a human form, there was only so much that could be done to go along unnoticed, and with each passing minute, his power waned just that much further, and with the dropping strength came the voice of the human mind he had tried to keep prisoner so many times over.

_I have to go home! I can't keep running away. They're my family, and I need their help if I'm ever going to figure out what the lab accident did to me. Turn around! Go home!_

"I have no home," Danny whispered quietly as he floated forlornly on an empty corner miles from the house that had nearly become the scene of his second death. Dropping silently to the concrete, he relaxed in his state of invisibility, taking a rest from the desperate flight he'd been so engulfed in.

**Say, what's up?**

**I wonder why**

**Do you listen to me?**

**I'm gonna make you do some freaky shit now**

Turning his head in the direction of distant sound, Danny watched as a cop car drove past, speeding through a red light towards whatever distant purpose the officers inside were to serve. Lowering himself to the ground, Danny soon lost all sense of the world around him as the taxing of his ghost powers drew him into blissful unconsciousness.

- - - - -

A feeling of something on his shoulder brought Danny out of the empty void of sleep, and his jade eyes met with those of a police officer, and looking over at the car parked on the curb, Danny could have sworn that it was the same car he'd seen just a few minutes...minutes? Wait…the officer could see him. That meant that…

**Insane, you're gonna die**

**When you listen to me**

**Let the living die  
**

**Let the living die  
**

Panicking, Danny was on his feet and bolting away, refusing to pay attention to the officer behind him telling him to stop. He could hear the sound of feet on the pavement behind him, knowing full well that he would not be able to continually outpace the officer. Dodging around a corner, Danny skidded on a patch of, by the smell at least, was spilled soda, and as the officer managed to catch up to him, he did the only thing that came to his mind.

He rolled over and punched the officer in the face.

As the man fell back from the force of the hit, Danny was able to regain his footing and began running again, his ears never hearing the officer call for backup. The human voice lying under his own consciousness began bellowing at him, accusing him of getting them arrested. As it was, he _had_ just assaulted a police officer.

**Say, are you breathing now?**

**Do the wicked see you?**

**You still breathing?**

**You're making me known!**

Realization came slowly to Danny as his sneakered feet smacked against the pavement, the sound of sirens reaching him as he continued to flee the city that was bent on tearing him apart. He was not getting out of this one alive. He was not going to survive the night.

A cop car skidded around the corner of the street just ahead of Danny, and he couldn't turn and run the other way in time, so as the officer ran up to her, he dropped low and caught her in the abdomen, sending her reeling to the ground as he continued running, succeeding in only running into this new officer's partner, who, within seconds, had Danny pinned and was affixing the handcuffs.

**Are you breathing now?**

**Do the wicked see you?**

**You still breathing?**

Animalistic survival instinct kicked in, and the cuffs were phazed out of, Danny pushing himself away from the two cops only to trip over his own two feet, smacking his face hard against the pavement. Feeling his arm taken into a tight grip, he turned to the officer and hit her again, kicking her in the chest as he rolled onto his feet once more. The second officer pinned him again, and Danny's fearful emerald eyes blinked back to normal as he fought against the officer, cold sea blues staring back.

"This isn't me!" Danny screamed before the specter in his mind beat him back into submission, taking over his body once again.

"Get off me!" he yelled, pelting the officer neatly between the legs before running off again, once more failing to hear what was said into the radio attached to the cop's shoulder as he ran away. Bolting down the street, Danny phazed through both police cars that were speeding towards him, leaving the occupants confused out of their collective minds.

**So, can you imagine how good going through this will make you feel?**

Slipping in and out of both invisibility and intangibility, Danny dodged nearly half a dozen more cars before he was caught off-guard, his hip mercilessly hit by the back end of another squad car as it spun to avoid him. Falling to the pavement, Danny phazed through the street, slipping down below the asphalt to the comforting and protecting darkness beneath the city streets.

**I promise, no one will ever know**

Running aimlessly and sightlessly through the streets, the black tar-stained stone rumbling as various vehicles rolled over head, Danny had no idea of where he was, let alone how long he'd been fleeing. The human voice in the back of his mind was screaming, a torrential agony of anger and fear, and Danny realized that if he could no longer keep the mortal mind in check, his powers would be nearly useless soon after, and he had no intention of turning solid while he was caught somewhere beneath the city streets.

Coming up topside, he was thankful that he'd done so in a shadowed place, discovering that he had actually made it nearly four miles from where he'd initially disappeared, now held within the penetrating shadows formed by the highway overpass he was currently beneath.

**There will be no chance of you getting caught**

The human voice came to the fore once again, screaming vehement protests and violent oaths he could never hope to keep.

_You realize what you've done? Do you know how much trouble you've gotten us into? You _attacked_ three different police officers and ran like they were hunting you! All they wanted was for me to go home, and now I have to deal with criminal charges because you're afraid of a gun?_

"It's not that simple. They all want us dead. We are animals to them, nothing more than a subject for their experiments, nothing but a slab of meat to dissect and look at."

_They're my parents! They don't want me dead! You saw the papers! All they want is me home, safe and alive!_

**They never loved you anyway**

"We have no home. All that there ever is for us is the shadows and the darkness. We have to run from the light, from the people you think care, because all they seek is your destruction. Couldn't you see it in that man's eyes? Your father wanted you dead." The voice fell silent, and Danny smirked, assured that he had won. With the few powers he did have, no one would ever be able to touch him, to hurt him, to destroy the sanctity of the life he had.

**So, come on, be a man, and do what you are compelled to do**

A noise came to his ears suddenly, and he turned only in time to feel a slight stinging sensation in his neck. Reaching around to the spot, he pulled out the small offending piece of metal, his vision starting to blur as he looked at the feathered contrivance. Falling over, his mind barely registered what was happening before the shadows dove in around him.

**Save me, God!**

He'd been hit with a tranquilizer dart.

- - - - -

Pale blue eyes opened to find worried purple eyes hovering over him, and he attempted to sit up, to explain what had happened, to let his mother know of all that had become of him, but something kept him pinned. Turning his head, he found himself tightly strapped against a piece of metal, the silver surface humming slightly and surrounded by a pale blue glow.

"What?" he managed, looking at the familiar sterile walls of the family basement lab. "What happened?"

"We've been wondering that ourselves, young man," his mother said admonishingly. "Three separate counts of assaulting an officer, resisting arrest, running from the officers after you were ordered to stop…Danny, what's gotten into you?"

**I can hear the voice**

**But I don't want to listen**

**Strap me down and tell me I'll be alright**

"I was hoping you'd be able to tell me," Danny answered softly, the muted buzzing starting up behind his eyes, the entity within – whatever it was – finally starting to wake up itself, and almost as soon as it realized what was going on, the pain exploded behind his eyes once more, and he screamed, the feral, malicious howl of a cornered animal escaping his own lips.

Looking towards his mother, he could see the fear and disbelief in her eyes, and he turned his head away, the mirrored surface to his right revealing what it was that had made his mother step back.

His eyes, usually an icy baby blue, were now a deep, permeating shade of green. And they were _glowing_.

**I can feel the subliminal need to be one with the voice**

**And make everything go…**

He felt the usual chill creep through his veins as the energy of the being within his mind tried to escape, but the second that the powers manifested on the surface, the edges of his body turning just vaguely ephemeral, a powerful jolt of electricity danced across the metal table he was on, subduing the ghost powers that had attempted to move him through the restraints.

"What…?" he asked, the reflection showing him the green bleeding from his irises, giving room for their normal hue to return. "What's going on?"

Maddie looked to Jack, who'd remained silent this entire time, then back at her son. "You seem to have been overshadowed by a ghost, Danny," she answered, "though all the ways we've known to remove ghosts from a human host have failed on you, as if the ghost has somehow linked up to you in another way we don't know about."

A whimpering sound of defeat played like a discordant harmony behind his eyes, making his head hurt worse than any headache ever had, and he slammed his eyes shut against the pain, his entire body tensing.

**I can hear the voice**

**But I don't want to listen**

**Strap me down and tell me I'll be alright**

Danny felt something viscous and warm run down his chin, and the coppery, salty taste that flowed over his tongue verified the thought that he'd bitten himself. Where, he wasn't certain of, but the taste of blood was something unmistakable.

A soft fabric touched against his skin, and he forced his eyes open enough to find that his mother was worriedly dabbing at the flowing carmine fluid, keeping it from dripping further down his face or onto his clothing.

"What's wrong with you, Danny?" Maddie asked, looking at the expression of pain dancing across his features.

Struggling to speak through the pain, Danny managed only a few short sentences. "There was an accident in the lab. About five months ago, I walked into the Portal and something happened to me. There's a voice always humming in my mind, behind my eyes. It wants me to run. It says you want to kill me."

**I can feel the subliminal need to be one with the voice**

**And make everything alright**

Maddie looked at her son, a million thoughts running through her head at once, and she closed her eyes, trying desperately to get her mind back under control.

Jack's voice broke her concentration. "He's been possessed," the elder man said. "That's why we couldn't remove the ghost. He wasn't overshadowed, he was possessed."

Danny turned to his mother. "What?"

"There's a theory that when a person is on the border of death, by accident or by natural cause, their body is open for a deeper invasion of ectoplasm. Since most ghosts are actually ectoplasmic remains of humans rather than physical remnants, it would be a consciousness that you interacted with."

Fear arced through Danny's mind. "What does that mean for me?" he asked. "I'm not going to be like this for the rest of my life, am I?"

**Are you breathing now?**

**Do the wicked see you?**

**You still breathing?**

**You're making me known!**

"I…" Maddie began, struggling with her words. "Honestly, Danny, we don't know. It depends on a lot of things – how attached the specter is to you, what part of you it latched on to, not to mention the fact that it takes a lot more to remove a ghost that's possessing a human than it does one merely overshadowing them."

"So you're saying I could die in the process?"

**Are you breathing now?**

**Do the wicked see you?**

**You still breathing?**

The silence that met his question was more than he needed to hear, and he hung his head resignedly. "Then you and Dad have no choice."

"Danny, we couldn't possibly…"

The voice behind his eyes was screaming, telling Danny that it had been proved right, that all that was sought was destruction because of his nature. "No," Danny spoke aloud, his voice deep and commanding. "They don't want to kill_ me_, whatever you are. They want you and you _alone_ to be the one to suffer for doing this to me." He looked at his parents. "Whatever it takes, get this thing away from me. All it does is make me something and someone I'm not. I'm not going to spend my life running from everything and hurting anyone that tries to get close to me."

**So, are you breathing?**

**So, do you breathe?**

**No, no.**

**So, are you breathing?**

**So, do you breathe?**

"Please, Mom. I know that this hurts, but I don't want to be a victim anymore. I don't want to leave you all wondering why I ran off. I want to be myself…however I can."

Maddie could find no words to say to her son, silently walking over to the bank of computer screens, sitting down at one of the consoles, slowly but assuredly typing in a command sequence.

Danny watched as something that looked like it could be a very powerful laser charged up, the arm moving the unit to point at him. Closing his eyes, he quelled the sound of the ectoplasmic being wailing within his mind as the beam of ethereal energy washed over him.

**No!**


End file.
